


to sit in hell with you

by nevernevergirl



Category: Runaways (TV 2017)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, brief mentions of past canon child abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-06-08 22:59:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15253932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nevernevergirl/pseuds/nevernevergirl
Summary: Chase trusts all of his friends. He trusts himself, most of the time, and he trusts Old Lace. But it’s different with Gert, in a way he doesn’t think there are actually words for, because it’s too big.Gert gets hurt on a supply run. It's not actually a big deal, but Gert's kind of a big deal. Chase has a few realizations.





	to sit in hell with you

**Author's Note:**

> Set sometime in season 2, established Gertchase! Very very very very very loosely based on parts of the Topher plotline from the comics and on an Instagram story Ariela deleted, haha, but no actual filming spoilers for season 2.

No matter what Molly thinks/hopes, they’re sort of terrible at the whole superhero thing.

 

Chase watched a ton of those kind of movies with Alex as a kid, and he’s pretty sure Superman could have handled a gas station robbery in two minutes, tops. It takes Chase almost that long just get his fistigons on after the kid whips out a knife. That’s pathetic, right?

 

In the meantime, Molly manages to lift the kid off the ground in a chokehold, so the other guy _pulls out a fucking gun,_ and Gert screams, ripping off Karolina’s bracelet. Karolina uses her rainbow blast thing to knock the gun out of the guy’s hand, and Chase levels a small energy shot at his feet for good measure, but Old Lace must have already picked up on Gert’s panic, because she _barrels through the fucking door_.

 

The cashier stares, because _there’s an actual dinosaur_ , and grabs for her phone, holding it up to snap a picture. The manager standing behind her stares and grabs for her phone, too, but mutters something about dialing 911 instead.

 

Which, you know, great idea. Definitely do that. Except the police are definitely looking for the four of them, which is not so great.

 

Chase looks between the girls (dinosaur included). “Yeah, we should go.”

 

Karolina nods, grabbing Molly by the hand the second she drops Offender #1 onto the floor. Gert kicks the dropped gun and knife as far across the store as she can manage, and then they’re off.

 

Nico and Alex are waiting in the van, parked on a side street a few blocks away. They’d had a plan. The four of them were supposed to grab food and supplies and keep their heads down while Lace waited in hiding, because she still refused to stay too far away from Gert. Alex would stay back in the van, ready to pick them up at the first sign of trouble, and Nico would stay for super powered back up in case trouble found the van instead. Karolina and Gert would leave the store first, and Chase and Molly would wait a couple of minutes before taking the long way back to the van. They used the buddy system. They were careful. They planned.

 

They’re even worse at planning than they are at being superheroes, probably.

 

Nico gets the doors open quickly when they run up, and Molly explains what happened through panting breaths. Karolina’s hugging Nico tightly over the seat, halfway to tumbling in her lap, when Chase finally turns, reaching for the door.

 

He stops, and he’s pretty sure he stops breathing for a second.

 

“Guys,” he says, staring out at the street. “Where the fuck is Gert?”

 

Molly’s face falls, and Karolina drops her arms from around Nico’s neck.

 

“She was right behind me,” Karolina says, a little frantically.

 

“She’s a slower runner than you guys,” Alex tries. “Give her a second.”

 

In the distance, a police siren wails, and Chase’s stomach drops.

 

“Shit. Fuck,” he mutters, moving to climb back out of the van. Nico grabs the back of his shirt. “Get _off_. I’m going to go get her.”

 

“And what, carry her back? Because that’ll be so much faster,” she snaps. “Alex, can you circle around without anyone seeing us?”

 

“We’re not leaving her,” Molly snaps. Karolina’s got a grip on her, but Chase is pretty sure she couldn’t actually hold Molly back; Molly’s not pushing her away because she trusts them with Gert. So they should probably _not_ let her down. Nico turns to her, her face a little softer than she’d been with Chase.

 

“Of course we’re not, Molls. We’re going to drive around and see if we can find her, so we’re not just sitting here when the police drive by.”

 

“And if she gets here, and we’re not here?” Chase snaps. “What, we just let her think we took off?”

 

“Gert’s smart,” Alex says, quietly. “She’ll figure it out, and stay out of sight until she sees us. Nobody’s getting left behind, we just can’t be sitting ducks.”

 

Chase knows it’s not actually a bad idea, but Gert’s not Alex or Nico’s girlfriend, so they’re not _getting_ it. He’s ready to argue again when, finally, he sees them.

 

Old Lace is rounding the block, sprinting toward them with Gert on her back, holding on for dear life. Molly screams her name as Old Lace jerks to a stop, and Gert winces as she slides off her back. Chase and Molly scramble forward, helping her in, and she leans over to quickly kiss Lace’s head before she takes off—they can’t really fit a dinosaur in the van with all six of them, so they’ve taught her to take the long way back to the hostel, staying hidden in side streets and trees. Usually, she beats them home. Traffic in the greater LA area is a bitch.

 

Karolina gets the door shut the second they get Gert fully in the van, and they’re finally heading out, away from the sirens.

 

“I’m sorry,” Gert says, out of breath as she settles between Chase and Molly. “I tripped, because I’m an idiot—”

 

“You’re not an idiot, the stupid sidewalk was cracked,” Molly mutters, and Gert smooths her sister’s hair back and out of her face absently.

 

“I think I twisted my ankle? I was trying to catch up, but I think Lace figured out it hurt, so she gave me a ride. We got here as fast as we could,” she says, rambling.

 

Chase shakes his head, bending down to examine her ankle. “We should have stopped. I should have made sure you were still there,” he mutters. Gert smiles a little—a small one, like she can’t help herself.

 

“Chase. Everyone was running, it’s not a big deal.”

 

He opens his mouth to argue, but she’s grabbing his arm and tugging him up, kissing him open mouthed and sloppy. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Molly making a face. He can hear Alex mutter something about security cameras and laying low, and Nico telling the staff to scan for cops.

 

He doesn’t really care.

 

He laces his fingers with Gert’s as he kisses her back.

  
  
  


Old Lace is tucked behind some boulders near the entrance to the hostel when they get home; she bounds over to the van the second they get the door open. After Chase and Molly help Gert out of the van, Lace kneels down, and Gert steps forward, going to climb on her back.

 

Hastily, carefully, Chase grabs her arm. “What are you doing?”

 

“Getting a ride,” she says, making a face. “It’s not like I can walk on it.”

 

“She’s a dinosaur! No offense, Lace,” he adds when Lace looks up, irritably. “I mean. I know she’ll be careful, but I can just carry you. Or just help you walk, or whatever.”

 

Gert raises her eyebrows. “Yeah, no.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“Because it’s not 1950?”

 

He rolled his eyes. “You couldn’t put weight on that in any decade, Gert. It doesn’t have to be me, if that’s what’s bothering you. Molly can can carry you in.”

 

“Molly’s not carrying me! Nobody is carrying me!”

 

Molly makes a face, stepping away from them and toward the hostel. “Yeah, no, _Molly’s_ going inside, because you’re doing that weird flirt-arguing thing again.”

 

“We’re not _flirting_ , Chase is protecting his fragile masculinity from my dinosaur,” Gert calls out, but Molly’s already at the door. Gert crosses her arms, leaning against the van with her foot just barely in the air as she glares at him.

 

“Gert, come on,” he groans. “You know I’m not trying to be a dick. It just looked like it hurt when she brought you back.”

 

Gert bites her lip and nods almost imperceptibly. “Fine. I’m getting on her, but if it hurts, you can help me.”

 

She pushes herself away from the van, moving to climb on to Old Lace. She wraps her arms around the dinosaur’s neck, and Old Lace moves up, slowly.

 

Gert winces, but she’s quiet, and that’s fine, he’s going to leave it alone. But then Lace takes a step forward, and Gert’s foot jostles, hitting her side.

 

“Shit _f_ _uck_ ,” Gert hisses, and Lace lowers down immediately as Chase walks over, helping her off.

 

Old Lace looks up, straight in his eyes, and does this weird...thing, sort of like a shrug? Chase thinks it’s supposed to be a shrug.

 

“Traitor,” Gert mumbles at the dinosaur, who legit rolls her eyes—Chase didn’t know dinosaurs could do that, but he’s not really surprised _Gert’s_ dinosaur can do that. Gert sighs, holding her arms up. “Okay. Just don’t make a big deal about it.”

 

“I would never,” he says, solemnly, before immediately sweeping her up (carefully) into the most dramatic bridal carry he can manage. She makes this super high-pitched squealing sound, which is exactly what he was going for. He grins.

 

“Asshole,” she mutters, and she kicks him, like, three times with her good leg before they actually get inside, because his girlfriend’s kind of a toddler, but it’s worth it for the way he can feel her kind of smiling against his neck.

  
  
  


He takes her straight to the room they’ve both been crashing in. When they first got to the hostel, they all made a big deal about claiming beds and sleeping on their own for the first time in weeks, but they all ended up dragging mattresses into the living room for the first couple of nights. They got used to the new space, eventually, and everyone sort of drifted off to their own rooms, but he and Gert sort of just...claimed the same bed. Molly ends up in their room half the time, but it’s still sort of _theirs_. It’s weird, but in the same good kind of way dinosaur shrugs are weird, he thinks.

 

He gets Gert settled on the bed and kisses her forehead; she blushes a little.

 

“Where’d you put that first aid kit?” he asks, softly.

 

“Should be under the bed.”

 

He rummages for a second before he finds it, setting it on the bed. It’s not really a real first aid kit, but Gert sort of panicked two days into this whole thing when Alex scraped his hand trying to set up their tent, and she’s been picking up supplies whenever she can find them. They’re pretty decently stocked, and he grins a little when he finds an ACE bandage, holding it up.

 

Gert smiles a little, wryly. “Yeah, when I got that, I kind of assumed we’d be using it on you,” she says, miming his fistigons.

 

“I’m going to ignore that, and just be glad you got it,” he jokes, setting the bandage on the bed and grabbing the x-ray goggles out of his bag to take a look first, sighing in relief. “Ok, not broken. So it’s probably just a twist or a sprain. Did you land on your foot? Like, hard?”

 

She watches him carefully, nodding a little. “Yeah, I tripped and tried to catch my balance.”

 

He nods, picking up her foot carefully to get the bandage around her ankle. “Thought so. It’ll probably be a bitch to walk on for a while, but it’ll hurt less in the morning. We can ice it, too,” he mumbled.

 

She watched him wrap up her ankle for a moment. “Look at who knows what he’s doing,” she says, lightly. “Dr. Stein.”

 

He rolls his eyes. “I’ve sprained my ankle before, it’s not rocket science.”

 

“Right. Because of lacrosse.” She says it carefully, and he can feel it—that shift in the conversation, bringing them right up to the edge of that Thing He’s Not Supposed to Talk About. And they _don’t_ talk about it. She was there the night his dad lost his fucking mind; he knows she knows, or she wouldn’t have said _lacrosse_ like that. But it still feels like he shouldn’t talk about it. He’s used to not talking about it.

 

He’s quiet for probably a little too long. “Yeah. Because of lacrosse.”

 

“Sports are toxic,” she says, but it’s not antagonistic. The way she says it feels like he’s just been offered a pardon.

 

It hits him hard and all at once, the way absolute truths have always hit him, truths like _Dad doesn’t actually like me that much_ and _Mom can’t fix this_ and _I really like Gert_.

 

He trusts her, absolutely.

 

He trusts all of his friends. He trusts himself, most of the time, and he trusts Old Lace. But it’s different with Gert, in a way he doesn’t think there are actually words for, because it’s too big. They argue about dumb shit all the time, but it’s never _real_ —he never feels like he’s one word away from fucking it up. She’s nosy as hell, but she knows when he can’t handle it. When he walks into a room, he always looks for her first, and she’s always looking back.

 

He trusts her. So he takes a deep breath, and he looks up.

 

“I know from other stuff, too,” he says, quietly. She’s silent as he finishes with the wrap and fiddles with the clip. “Um. I hurt my ankle like this a couple of years ago, I guess. Dad pushed me on the stairs. I mean, I was on the bottom step,” he adds, like the detail matters, like it softens it. He feels his face turn red.

 

She sits up, scooting forward carefully until she’s close enough to take his face in her hands. “Hey. He shouldn’t have done that. He’s a piece of shit.”

 

Her voice is even and matter-of-fact, and he _trusts Gert_ , and when she says it, it actually sounds true. It’s not that easy, probably. He’s pretty sure he’s just starting to realize how fucked up he is. But it’s really, really good to hear when she says it like that.

 

“He’s a murderer,” he says, quietly. He’s not sure why he says it. “I mean. He’s a terrible person. We knew that.”

 

She shrugs. “Yeah. But still.”

 

“Thanks.” He places a hand on her thigh and runs his thumb against the seam of her jeans absently. “I can go find some ice. Or I think we have frozen vegetables.”

 

“Yeah, that would be good,” she nods, then bites her lip. “Chase?”

 

“Yeah, Gert?”

 

“I know you weren’t trying to be a dick about carrying me,” she says, and it’s good to hear, but he already sort of knew that. He’s not really sure why she’s saying it until he catches the look in her eyes, and then he gets it—she’s trusting him too.

 

Holy shit.

 

He nods a little. “I know that.”

 

“It really wasn’t a big deal, you carried me, like, 50 feet. And I know you were just helping, and you didn’t mean it like that. I don’t know why I said you did,” she mumbles. “Or I do, I guess.”

 

“Defense mechanism?” he teases, and she snorts.

 

“Something like that.” She shakes her head. “I’m, like. Stubborn. And I think I’m probably always going to consider the worst case scenario. I guess part of it’s my anxiety? But I think maybe I’m just...difficult, you know? I can’t let shit be easy.”

 

He shrugs. “Me either. I mean, I kind of just react to shit. And sometimes I’m an asshole about it. I don’t know if it’s because of my dad—”

 

“Not because you’re like him,” she says, automatically, and he smiles a little. He only half meant it like that, and he’s only half convinced she’s right, but he likes that she believes that. She’s one of the smartest people he knows, so maybe it’s true.

 

“I just mean I don’t think you’re difficult. Or maybe I’m difficult too, so it doesn’t matter.”

 

She shrugs and leans her head on his shoulder.

 

“I think we’ve been okay,” she says, quietly. “It’s not like we’re fighting. I know we’re not on the same page all of the time. But it feels like we’re okay at getting there eventually, you know?”

 

He nods a little. He wants to tell her how scared he was when he realized she wasn’t in the van. He wants to tell her how he feels like he’s going to throw up everytime her ankle makes her wince. He wants to tell her what he just realized about trust.

 

“I think whatever we’re doing,” he says, carefully, “I think it’s working.”

 

That’s what he _needs_ to tell her.

 

She places her hand over his, letting her fingers slot in between the gaps of his.

 

“Yeah. Me too.”


End file.
